


Their Names

by GreyLiliy



Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One)
Genre: Angst, Character Study, Gen, Unhealthy Relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-13
Updated: 2013-12-13
Packaged: 2021-03-02 02:27:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 732
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23617480
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GreyLiliy/pseuds/GreyLiliy
Summary: Prowl and the Constructicons share a past hurt courtesy of Spike Witwicky.
Relationships: Constructicons & Prowl
Kudos: 8





	Their Names

**Author's Note:**

> [First posted to Tumblr on December 13, 2013 as “Drabble #102 - Prowl/Constructicons.” Crossposted to Archive of Our Own on April 12, 2020. Only the work itself has been posted.]
> 
> Written as a Request.

Prowl knew their names.

Of course he knew their names. He had known their names long before he had been inside their heads. That was his job. To know everything. As for this particular set of individuals, he’d even personally investigated the death of one of their own at the hands of the ex-Autobot Ally, Spike Witwicky. A death that he couldn’t figure out if it hurt more before his transformation, due to the betrayal by someone he trusted, or now after, when it felt like a piece of him was still missing.

But oh did it hurt, either way. Prowl didn’t think that anybody truly understood the ache in his spark that still lingered from that moment. No one could even comprehend how much Prowl had loved humanity, that species on that far off rock with such short life spans and so numerous. His moments with them, were some of the most precious of his life. He’d served with them. Lived with them. Prowl would rather have died than see one of their littlest suffer.

So to have that man, someone Prowl considered one of his own, stab them in the back that way. It–Prowl almost couldn’t handle it. It had hurt.

“That’s the way it is,” someone had said. “They’re just like us. Of course one of them betrayed us. Can’t trust anyone.”

The logic behind it didn’t make it hurt less. So Prowl buried it. Buried it away and pretended it didn’t bother him. He had to focus on the now. Their own crisis. Their own problems. And now, their own planet, and the mechs that were suddenly inhabiting it. But it lingered. The ache.

But they knew.

They understood now. They’d seen how Prowl thought, and they’d been inside his head. Prowl’s spark shuddered by the thought. They knew just how badly Spike Witwicky had hurt them both with a single action. It was an ache that joined them even closer than the reconstructive surgery to make a mech into a combiner. It was okay, they’d whisper along the side of his processor. They’d work through it together. They acknowledged that it had mattered. That Prowl’s pain meant something, because they felt it too.

Prowl grit his teeth and threw himself into the work on his make-shift table in their sanctuary far from Starscream’s new city. They didn’t really care though. Or maybe they did. The thoughts were still muddled from the joining, but he knew one thing was for certain, they were looking.

Looking for a replacement.

Prowl refused to give it to them. He wouldn’t step into that role. No matter how they begged, no matter how they pleaded.

He’d never.

Prowl knew their names, but he refused to use them. That would make it personal. He’d be acknowledging them as individuals and equals in a way that the use of their names before never could address. He focused on the others, the ones who really mattered. And he made a vow–Prowl would not give them the satisfaction. He’d seen what they’re like, and he’d been a part of them.

Even now, he had nightmares of a new name running through his head.

“I am De–”

Destruction. Denial. Detriment. Devastation. Derailing, and Detestable.

Prowl wouldn’t say that name. It was not his own, no matter what the other new voices in his head told him. No matter what the new voice in the back of his own head told him. Prowl rubbed the side of his helm, and watched them from the corner of his optic. They rough housed with the Dinobots, and teased Arcee. But they always knew where Prowl was, just as Prowl was always aware of where they were.

There was a connection there, that neither of them could deny.

And they knew it.

Prowl could fight it all he wanted. He could shut them out, but they didn’t care. They’d chosen. Prowl was their new leader, their missing piece. He could do what he wanted, because they had chosen him. It was his head that they wanted. Prowl could use it as he saw fit. They were happy even to be shut out.

They were patient. Prowl could only hold to this one thing. Because they could wait.

He knew their names, just as well as he knew his own.

But he wouldn’t say it.

Prowl could never say it.


End file.
